Mindbender
by the Lia Fail
Summary: The Moya crew comes across a U.S. space shuttle. Someone else from Earth is out here? Noo. But wait Crichton recognizes the shuttlefrom a TV show. Is this fah real, or is someone trying to get at that wormhole tech yet again?


This is a work of fiction. I worship Rockne S. O'Bannon and will not profit from this little escapade. Please, nobody sue me. All I have to offer are education loan repayments. Since I went to school out-of-state, those are pretty sizeable. :( "Mindbender" has no real place in the Farscape timeline; the only thing I can tell you is that it takes place after Scorpy invades Crichton's mind. But I couldn't resist the idea of our favorite lost astronaut meeting another lost astronaut. "Two ships meeting in the night" and all that. If you like it, send me feedback. I like feedback. If you don't, send me feedback anyway. Just keep in mind this is unfinished, and gimme three steps toward the door.

Knock yourself out!

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Crichton smiled. Here was one of the best places he had ever been: the Florida coast, Cocoa Beach. In front of him, out over the Atlantic, the sun was setting hurriedly, chased by the broiling black clouds that dominated the sky just above him. If he looked straight up, he could see stripes of lightning. They matched his mood—he couldn't get rid of the feeling that something was going to go terribly wrong tomorrow. Crichton looked out at the ocean; and suddenly something inside him told him he wouldn't see it again.

A light rain pelted him and the sand around him; but he sat there anyway, enjoying the view, liking the feel of the rain on his skin, focusing on the external and trying to ignore the internal.

The red sun melted into the horizon; maybe a quarter of it peeked out at the stormy mass overhead. It gave up the chase and disappeared from sight.

Thunder rolled overhead—

--and Crichton tumbled out of bed as Moya pitched and rolled. He came to rest on the floor, only to slide headfirst into the wall as Moya swayed again. He put his hand on the wall and patted it.

"Little too much to drink last night?" he asked the ship, caressing the bump on his head. Where was his communicator? There. On his shirt, hung haphazardly over the back of the chair—all the way across the room. His cell was tiny, but he might as well have crawled a mile to the chair, stopping to anchor himself on the ends of his bed when Moya dipped again.

Crichton grabbed the shirt and yelled into the communicator. "Pilot! What's going on up there?" He worked himself to a standing position. Moya rolled again. This time he braced himself against the table.

He tapped the communicator. No answer. "Yo, Pilot!" he yelled. When the roll straightened out, Crichton took a chance and raced out of the room, headed for command. "Aeryn, D'Argo, Zhaan, Pip! On my way to command!"

"I shall meet you there, John." Zhaan's quiet but forceful voice sounded through the communicator.

Aeryn met up with John in the hallway, fully dressed. John frowned as she joined in the race to command. "Peacekeepers do sleep, right?"

"Not much chance of that on this ship," she replied dryly.

John tapped the communicator again. "Pilot, homey, purple guy, wassup?"

"I _suggest_ you refrain from asking a question to which I have no answer," Pilot snipped. "Much less one I can't understand."

John raised his eyebrows at Aeryn. "Somebody got up on the wrong side of the neural network this morning."

Aeryn rolled her eyes. Pilot continued in a maddeningly reasonable tone. "I have no explanation for the sudden disturbance in Moya's systems." The Leviathan's pilot hesitated.

John came to a halt in the middle of the hallway. "Pilot?"

Pilot sounded sheepish. "I seem to have lost navigational controls."

John looked at Aeryn. She nodded and took off down another hallway, headed for Pilot's chamber.

Crichton reached Command and skidded to a stop beside Ka D'Argo. "What'd you break this time, big guy?"

The Luxan harrumphed. "I just arrived here myself."

"Do you know what kind of a bump I just received, and where?" Rygel the Sixteenth's throne sled whirred into the room, followed by Zhaan.

"No Rygel, and please don't show us." Zhaan narrowed her eyes at the Hynerian before turning her attention to Pilot's clamshell. "Pilot? What can you tell us?"

"We are receiving a transmission," Pilot informed them. "I will put it on screen." Various arms flashed in and out of view as Pilot manipulated the correct controls.

The screen remained black.

"Can we get a visual on that?" Crichton yelled.

In the clamshell, Pilot frowned. "I'm sorry—it seems to be audio only."

For lack of anything better to look at, the crew turned their attention to the blank viewscreen anyway.

"—repeat, do not attempt a breakaway," the voice commanded. "I am in dire need of assistance. Over."

"Well, that explains the loss of navigational controls," Aeryn chimed in, appearing on Pilot's clamshell.

"DMV from hell," Crichton muttered. D'Argo shot him a look as the voice continued. "Pilot, any ideas?"

"I suggest we break now. We may still have a chance," D'Argo offered gruffly.

"That is not possible, Ka D'Argo," Pilot returned. "I do now have a visual for you." One of his arms moved, and suddenly the view screen showed another ship.

Not a ship. A shuttle. Not just any shuttle, either; it was the—

Crichton frowned. "Is there any reason why this ship should look familiar to me?"

Aeryn appeared on the clamshell next to Pilot. "As far as I can tell, we haven't yet encountered this one before." She shrugged. "Not to mention its design is practically archaic."

"Yeah, for the Peacekeepers maybe," Crichton said as he rounded the navigational control board, "but not for Earth."

"Perhaps that's why it looks like yours." Aeryn gave Crichton a thin smile.

"We are being drawn toward the ship," Pilot reported. And indeed it grew closer, filling the viewscreen.

Rygel groaned.

Chiana announced her presence by smacking the Hynerian on the back of the head, startling Rygel as well as Zhaan. "Before he starts complaining," she explained to Zhaan as Rygel clumsily rubbed the sore spot.

"I'm afraid you're several hundred years too late for that," the Delvian informed her, then turned back to the control panel.

"Wait." D'Argo turned to Crichton. "You say you recognize this ship?"

Crichton swallowed and squinted, trying to look closer. "Pilot, can we get a better view?"

"It looks like that pile of space junk you're so attached to," Chiana observed. "You know. The one sitting in the cargo bay." She flashed a grin at Crichton and chirped.

"Yeah, thanks, Chiana," Crichton told the Nebari. "Pilot, how about that view?"

"I've no doubt we'll be getting one," Aeryn returned drily. "We have only 4000 metras to go. We should be coming in just underneath it."

D'Argo turned to Crichton. "Well?"

Crichton glanced at D'Argo. "Well what?"

D'Argo stood up straight. The Luxan did not like to play games. "You said you recognize this vessel," he reminded Crichton. "If so, we should recognize it as well. Since we have all been together for the last several cycles, there is nothing you could not recognize that we should not also."

"That's a long speech there, D'Argo," Chiana chided. She tilted her head and clapped her hands, grinning. "But I think what Crichton means that this is a ship from Earth." She glanced at Crichton. "Am I right?"

Rygel guffawed. "Never did you think of that one, you stupid Luxan." D'Argo growled and hissed, but Rygel's throne-sled took him out of reach.

"Is this true?" Aeryn asked from the clamshell. "Do you recognize it, John?"

Crichton recognized it all right. The vehicle onscreen was actually a payload. No rocket. But there was an American flag painted on the side with the letters U.S.A.underneath. Crichton raised a hand and covered his mouth in disbelief.

It couldn't be. Could it?

_Anything is possible, especially in the Uncharted Territories, right, John?_

"John?" Aeryn prodded.

"Actually," Crichton managed, "I think I'm finally cracking up."

Rygel maneuvered his throne sled closer to the screen. "There's writing on it."

Crichton rolled his eyes. "It's the same writing as on my module, Sparky."

"Well, what does it say?" Chiana wanted to know.

Crichton took a deep breath. "U. S. A."

"U. S. A?" D'Argo sounded out the letters. "You can actually read that?"

"It's English," John told him. "My native language. The one I'm speaking in right now except the translator microbes interpret it for you. That's the written version." He pointed to the burned, blackened rocket.

"Rather archaic," Rygel harrumped.

"This coming from an amphibian," Chiana retorted.

"What's that got to do with it?" Rygel hissed.

"Pip, Froggy—shut it down or take it outside," Crichton ordered.

"What type of vessel is it?" Aeryn broke in.

"It's a payload," John replied. "That's how we get into space right now. Two booster rockets propel the payload up through Earth's atmosphere and launch it into orbit."

Rygel harrumphed. "Even on Hyneria we have vessels more advanced than that."

Aeryn too bore a doubtful look. "You're telling me that thing actually gets into space?"

"Guys, cut the crap. We can yak about my inferiority and all that happy stuff later. My question is, can we get that ship? Can we bring it on board?"

Aeryn's eyes went wide. "You're saying that thing is meant to carry _people_?"

Crichton let out a long, defeated sigh. "It's a passenger rocket, Aeryn. Emphasis on _passenger_. Did you or did you not hear the voice?"

_But that means admitting you heard the voice, John. And it's not possible, is it John?_

Behind him Chiana snorted. "You're right, Crichton. It really was dumb luck that you found the wormhole technology." She and Rygel shared a chuckle.

"Hey!" Crichton protested. "Without my dumb luck you'd be a Nebari zombie."

Chiana raised her eyebrows. "Ouch, Crichton. That hurt."

"Just do what he says and be quiet," D'Argo ordered. "Can you do that?"

"It just can't be," Crichton said to no one in particular. "It's just not possible." For on the side of the payload craft, underneath U.S.A and the American flag, was scripted Ranger 3.

_That's right, John_, Scorpy said. _It can't be possible. Buck Rogers doesn't exist._

"Buck Rogers doesn't exist," John said out loud.

"Who's Buck Rogers?" Chiana inquired, sidling up to Crichton and, imitating him, stared at the viewscreen. "What's so special about that?"

"Crichton," Aeryn reported. "I don't think you have to worry about picking it up. It's headed toward the docking bay. I've lost control over that area. Whatever it is we're about to find out. I suggest you start heading in that direction."

"Ahh, this is just great," Crichton groaned, and took off at a run, making sure Wynnona was clamped to his hip.


End file.
